The monkey had been ill three weeks—"la febbre," [Footnote: La febbre: the fever.] explained the old man. We knelt one on each side of the bed, and the sick animal looked at me with her mute prayer for help. Her nose was hot, as it is with sick children and dogs, her face wrinkled like that of an old, old woman, and her eyes had got quite a human expression. Her breathing was so short, and we could hear how it rattled in her throat. The diagnosis was not difficult—she had consumption. Now and again she stretched out her thin arms as if she implored us to help her, and Don Gaetano thought that she did so because she wished to be bled. I would willingly have given in in this case, although opposed in principle to this treatment, if I had thought it possible that any benefit could have been derived from it; but I knew only too well how unlikely this was, and I tried my best to make Don Gaetano understand it. Unhappily I did not know myself what there was to be done. I had at that time a friend amongst the keepers of the monkey-house in the Jardin des Plantes, and the same night he came with me to have a look at her; he said that there was nothing to be done, and that there was no hope. And he was right. For one week more the fire blazed in Don Gaetano's garret, then it was left to go out, and it became cold and dark as before in the old man's home.
True, he got his barrel-organ out from the pawn-shop, and now and then a copper fell into his hat. He did not die of starvation, and that was about all he asked of life.
The spring came and I left Paris; and God knows what become of Don
Gaetano.
If you happen to hear a melancholy old barrel-organ in the courtyard, go to the window and give a penny to the poor errant [Footnote: Errant: wandering.] musician—perhaps it is Don Gaetano! If you find that his organ disturbs you, try if you like it, better by making him stand a little farther off, but don't send him away with harshness! He has to bear so many hard words as it is; why should not we then be a little kind to him—we who love music?
—AXEL MUNTHE (adapted).
[Footnote: What interested the author in the old organ-grinder? What was the music like? Explain the title of the story. By what incidents does the author show the unselfish devotion of the old musician for his pet? Was his pet winning or lovable? Why did the old man care so much for it? Is the picture of the old man dignified or sordid?
Why? Point out instances of dramatic contrast. Are the descriptions in the story simple or elaborate?]
OUT OF DOORS
St. Guido [Footnote: Saint Guido was a fanciful name given to the little boy because his shock of golden curls looked like the nimbus around a saint's head.] ran out at the garden gate into a sandy lane, and down the lane till he came to a grassy bank. He caught hold of the bunches of grass and so pulled himself up. There was a footpath on the top which went straight in between fir-trees, and as he ran along they stood on each side of him like green walls. They were very near together, and even at the top the space between them was so narrow that the sky seemed to come down, and the clouds to be sailing but just over them, as if they would catch and tear in the fir-trees. The path was so little used that it had grown green, and as he ran he knocked dead branches out of his way. Just as he was getting tired of running he reached the end of the path, and came out into a wheat-field. The wheat did not grow very closely, and the spaces were filled with azure corn-flowers. St. Guido thought he was safe away now, so he stopped to look.
There were the fir-trees behind him—a thick wall of green—hedges on the right and left, and the wheat sloped down towards an ash-copse in the hollow. No one was in the field, only the fir-trees, the green hedges, the yellow, wheat, and the sun overhead. Guido kept quite still, because he expected that in a minute the magic would begin, and something would speak to him. His cheeks, which had been flushed with running, grew less hot, but I cannot tell you the exact color they were; for his skin was so white and clear, it would not tan under the sun, yet being always out of doors it had taken the faintest tint of golden brown mixed with rosiness. His blue eyes which had been wide open, as they always were when full of mischief, became softer, and his long eyelashes drooped over them. But as the magic did not begin, Guido walked on slowly into the wheat, which rose nearly to his head, though it was not yet so tall as it would be before the reapers came. He did not break any of the stalks, or bend them down and step on them; he passed between them, and they yielded on either side. The wheat-ears were pale gold, having only just left off their green, and they surrounded him on all sides as if he were bathing.